After spending five days at the Forte Village Resort in Santa Margherita di Pula, the National Team resumed training at Coverciano yesterday ahead of the Nations League finals. In Enschede on Thursday, Mancini’s men will face Spain for the third time in two years in a semi-final match after Italy’s penalty shootout victory at EURO 2020 and La Furia Roja’s win in the 2021 Nations League. At stake is a place in the final on 18 June in Rotterdam against either the Netherlands or Croatia.

This morning, the five Inter players in Mancini’s squad arrived at Coverciano following the Champions League final against Manchester City. Darmian, Acerbi, Bastoni, Dimarco and Barella, all of whom started the game, will have to quickly put the disappointment of the defeat behind them after an excellent Nerazzurri display. One of the standout players in Istanbul was Francesco Acerbi, who managed to nullify Haaland and, in doing so, proved he possesses the qualities to stop one of the strongest strikers in the world. “He’s twice the striker he was when he was at Dortmund and I faced him three years ago,” said the Inter defender in his press conference today. “He’s a brilliant striker, but we did really well as a team.”

Now 35, Acerbi has just enjoyed probably the best season of his career: “After my illness, I continued to improve and have always had good seasons. I try to keep myself in top shape and have plenty of hunger and desire. Then, of course, there’s the group I play with and a bit of luck involved; I haven’t suffered any injuries.” Inter more than matched Manchester City, and it could have gone differently: “When you lose, it’s not failure, but a lesson. You win and you lose hoping there will be more victories than defeats. You need to be proud of what you’ve done, even if it is bitter. My feeling out on the pitch was that weren’t quite confident enough that we could really inflict damage on City. There was a lot of talk about how strong they are, and, on a subconscious level, we paid the price for this a bit.”

Now, there’s a need to immediately turn the page by trying to lift a trophy that Italy have never won. “That’s what I’m now focusing on: the match on Thursday. We respect Spain but don’t fear them, and we know their strengths and weaknesses. It’s an important match that we want to win to progress to the final.” After the European Championship triumph at Wembley and missing out on the World Cup, the Nations League could represent a new turning point for the Azzurri: “We were the European Champions and not qualifying for the World Cup was probably our own fault. Now, there’s the Nations League, which we want to win. We’ll put in even more to make it happen.”

On the day that the most successful president in the history of Italian football passed away (“Berlusconi was a brilliant man and great entrepreneur. His death really hit me”), Acerbi also spoke about what has been a positive season for Italian clubs. While Inter, Roma and Fiorentina were defeated in the European finals they played, their respective runs are a positive sign for Italian football: “It’s been an important season; nothing like this had happened before. I don’t know if it’s the beginning of something, and the Premier League is the best division right now, but we’re Italy, a country with many strong players and many youngsters who can play. It’s proof that Italian football is of an excellent standard.”

NATIONS LEAGUE FINALS SQUAD

Goalkeepers: Gianluigi Donnarumma (Paris Saint-Germain), Alex Meret (Napoli), Guglielmo Vicario (Empoli);
Defenders: Francesco Acerbi (Inter), Alessandro Bastoni (Inter), Leonardo Bonucci (Juventus), Matteo Darmian (Inter), Giovanni Di Lorenzo (Napoli), Federico Dimarco (Inter), Leonardo Spinazzola (Roma), Rafael Toloi (Atalanta);
Midfielders: Nicolò Barella (Inter), Bryan Cristante (Roma), Davide Frattesi (Sassuolo), Jorginho (Arsenal), Lorenzo Pellegrini (Roma), Marco Verratti (Paris Saint-Germain), Nicolò Zaniolo (Galatasaray);
Forwards: Federico Chiesa (Juventus), Wilfried Gnonto (Leeds), Ciro Immobile (Lazio), Giacomo Raspadori (Napoli), Mateo Retegui (Tigre).

Schedule (all times CEST)

Monday 12 June

14:00 - Press conference

17:45 - Training (first 15 minutes open to the press)

Tuesday 13 June

13:30 - Press conference

18:00 - Training (behind closed doors)

Wednesday 14 June

10:00 - Training (first 15 minutes open to the press)

19:30 CEST - Press conference, Head Coach and a player at the FC Twente Stadion

*Video footage of training sessions and press conferences at Coverciano is produced by the FIGC. INFO: m.reale@figc.it.